Feedback: Taxpayers Upset Over Property Values

Bill Paige says a new property reevaluation in the town of Potsdam jumped his assessment from $70,000 to more than $94,000 on his Wright Road residence and he's not happy about it.

"I can't take much more," he said.

Town Assessor Jim Snyder says it's the first reassessment the town has done on close to 5,500 properties in five years.

While the average residential assessments went up by 13 percent, the assessment on some properties doubled.

Others jumped by $100,000 or more.

Since the assessment change notices went out over the weekend, Snyder's office has been dealing with upset taxpayers.

"Everybody got looked at. Everybody got re-assessed. Whether it was good or bad or whatever they may have thought, some people stayed the same, some people went down, some people went up," said Snyder.

One of the problems is that Potsdam has very few big industries so most of the tax burden rests squarely on the shoulders of property owners, like Paige.

"There's no fairness to it," said Paige.

But, officials say, just because a property owner's assessment increases doesn't always mean their taxes will go up, even though that's a natural assumption.

"Ideally, what I forecast is the tax rates to decrease since the assessed value increased," said Snyder.

Property owners who want to challenge their assessments can go before the town's assessment review board on grievance day May 28 or, as a last resort, take their case to court.